The Last House In The Woods

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All Rise...

Judge David Johnson recommends staying away from the last house in the woods. The second-to-last? That one's okay.

The Charge

Italian horror has returned.

Opening Statement

The story may be familiar—hapless outsiders find themselves enduring g
a living nightmare in a house full of inbred, cannibal weirdos—but this
import carves a nice reputation all its own.

Facts of the Case

I love the opening sentence of the disc case synopsis: "Young lovers
escape a group of bullies." That's an understatement. Our two protagonists
are accosted by a group of deranged wannabe rapists, far from bullies, who force
them to take solace in the home of a mysterious couple.

It's not long until the sanctuary turns into a hellhole. The family is
messed up something fierce. There's dad, the hornball, mom, the sadistic
matriarch, their two sons, the mentally challenged murderers and their little
boy, a cannibal with sharpened teeth. The blood flows freely and one by one,
whoever enters the house ends up sucking on the business end of a chainsaw.

The Evidence

This is the third film I've reviewed under the "Ghost House
Underground" moniker and it is easily the best. Director Gabrielle Albanesi
has brought back Italian horror in a big way with this release; a bloody, creepy
splatterfest that draws inspiration from the likes of Texas Chainsaw
Massacre. Then again, I guess it's near impossible to make a horror movie
about a family of cannibal yokels and not be compared to the classics.

Anyway, the film doesn't waste much time getting into the nitty-gritty. Once
our young lovers end up in the house, Albanesi stomps on the accelerator and
cranks up the bloodletting. In the commentary he said he wanted to keep the
graphic violence to a minimum, but I'm not seeing that here: chainsaws hack off
limbs, ragged leg stumps spew arterial spray, throats are opened up, knives are
buried into torsos and a young boy tears out large swaths of flesh with his
mouth. Really, quart for quart, this may just be one of the messiest, goopiest
slasher flicks I've seen in some time.

An added bonus: the characters are more than the typical target practice.
The boyfriend/girlfriend duo are sympathetic, mainly because of how they were
terrorized in the beginning, but also because of the sheer physical and
emotional abuse that is foisted upon them during their stay in the titular
house. Towards the end of the film, three more characters enter the fray, and
Albanesi has some fun playing with preconceived notions, flipping former
douchebags into characters I was rooting for. The villains are memorable as
well, especially Evil Mom and her whacked-out Evil Human Flesh-Eating son.

Finally, points awarded for the bizarre ending and the reveal of the purpose
behind the family's grotesque actions. There's one shot—you'll what it
is—that's really out there.

So The Last House in the Woods: a fine piece of Italian cannibal
slasher horror, something that does its ancestry proud.

The 1.78:1 anamorphic widescreen is solid, if low-budget. Two stereo tracks
for the audio: English and Italian. Extras include a commentary by Gabriele
Albanesi, a short film starring more creepy kids, behind-the-scenes footage and
trailers.

Closing Statement

Splatter-happy and demented, this is a horror outing worth tracking down.